30. Chapter 24

Rosalie:

I woke up the next morning next to a warm body. Thinking it was Dustin, I sank into farther, then pulled away quickly when my eyes caught sight of black ink. Dustin didn't have a tattoo on his side... Then I realized. He was gone. Dustin was gone. Replaced by this stranger.

My hands quickly went down to my clothes, hoping that they were still there, and they were. A sigh of relief rushed through me, tingling the very ends of my toes. For a second I looked at the mop of hair covering the pillow, then it hit me. This wasn't Dustin, or Jasper, or Issac, or Jason, or anyone I knew...so...who was it? My eyes widened with the response. Foster. No...no, no, no. Nothing else went through my mind as I grabbed my bag from the corner, zipped it, and stumbled out the door.

Goodbye Foster, I'm sorry. But...but, I didn't mean it. I didn't mean for any of this to happen. This is all my fault. I'm sorry...

Dustin:

The house I was taken to my first day in France flashed before my eyes. This was the house I was taken to when I had hit my head on the bench, where I was carried to on the back of a middle-aged man with his son shouting for help behind us. Then, it was gone. I was in the abandoned ware-house with Rose again. The memory of her dancing as I woke up tickled at the edges of my mind, but I pushed it away. I couldn't think of that.

"Remember,"

The voice took me by surprise. My body jerked to the side, away from where the voice was, but it was everywhere; it echoed everywhere. The side of my stomach smacked into something hard. I was trapped; trapped in an invisible box...with nowhere to go. My hands felt around the edges of the box, trying in vain to find a way out...but there wasn't one. Blood ran down my hands as the walls of the cage tore at my nails, leaving them jagged and torn.

"Remember," The voice sounded again. I collapsed on the ground.

"Remember what?" My voice sounded whiny and cracked. Like a 5 year old that was just told that he couldn't play until he finished all his vegetables.

"Remember," Pictures flashed before my eyes almost too quickly for me to see them. A fire, followed by a splatter of blood, ground littered with bodies, a gun pointed at a young woman's head, tears, streaming tears...

"Stop!" I screamed so loud tears of my own tore at my eyes. I gasped for breath. "Stop," They stopped. Everything went black. I slid my hand up the side of the box, using it to lift my shaking form from the ground, leaning heavily against the wall.

"Remember why you came here. Remember why you came here and the consequences won't be so severe. Remember..." Something hard smacked into my chest, flinging me backwards and through shattering glass...

Where am I?

"Son, son are you alright?"

Who is that?

"Boy, can you here me?"

Yes.

"Open your eyes if you can here me,"

I can't.

"You were having a nightmare son, open your eyes,"

Nightmare?

I open my eyes to a room that is constantly shaking, my head in the hands of an elderly man. That's when I remembered, I was on a bus, a bus back to London...

Kale:

Once I sat down next to her, her newspaper went back up, covering her face once again.

What's with her?

"How did you know Harry was Jasper's father?" The words seemed to tumble out of my mouth before I could control them.

Without any emotion or indication that she heard me, she spoke, "They look so much alike," I nodded. Seems like a legit answer, but the way she's acting now...it's like she didn't even care in the first place.

A loud noise pulsed through the air around us. Her hand reached down for her pocket, drawing out a small phone. She opened it and scanned the text. Her body went ridged. Without another word, she stood up and started for the door. I couldn't let her go now, I hadn't found out what I wanted! Without thinking, I blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

"Hey! I didn't get your name!" The next time her foot landed, she stopped, standing still.

I saw a flick of her hair as she turned her head to throw over her shoulder, "Estelle,"

I nodded as she left, the doors swinging shut behind her. The light reflected off something on the bench, catching my attention. A disk. As I flicked my gaze towards it, two things clicked in my mind:

1) The only thing I knew about her was her name. Estelle.

And 2) Whatever was on this disk, was the answer to what I wanted to know.

So, I didn't give it a second thought when I stuffed it in my jacket pocket and headed for the cafeteria.

Jasper:

'BANG! BANG!'

I jerked awake, my hands clawing at the bedding. The silent room became more silent as the ringing in my ears faded. I shook my head to clear the rest, then had my eyes scan the room to see the door beginning to open. A familiar pair of green eyes calmed me.

"Good to see you're awake," His smile showed off his dimples.

"Hey dad," My smile also over took my face, showing off my own set of dimples that I had inherited from him. Then it hit me, I had run away...he was probably mad... My smile faded as my eyes fell shamefully from his face to my folded hands on my lap. "Sorry..."

"'Sorry' doesn't begin to cut it..." And then, "...I'm just glad to see you're ok. It's been a few days since we found you here," Tears pricked at his eyes. Something was wrong...he never cried when it came to me...

"Dad...what's going on...?" He sniffed, blinking to keep the tears from falling to his cheeks.